While he’s certainly not the NFL superstar that Brett Favre was at
the time, Mike Modano could certainly start to draw some comparisons to
the this summer to the quarterback. Just a week after the NHL regular
season ended, Modano is already answering questions about his decision
on retirement and if anything, he’s even more undecided that he was
while skating around Minnesota ice with a North Stars jersey on his
back.

Talking to reporters on Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway, Modano had this to say about his decision for this summer.

“It’s really hard,
I’m really kind of on the fence right now,” he said. “It’s tough. And then you watch some of
the playoffs, watch some of those games and it’s like those are
the things that you miss.”

Not helping matters
is how the Dallas Stars finished their season, missing the playoffs for
the second straight year. For a player with as much pride as Modano,
this cannot sit well.

“That’s the hard
part. You leave on a real bad taste in your mouth about how we
played,” Modano said. “That too is a real motivating factor
because you hate to end on that type of note. You like to go in the
playoffs, make a good run and have some excitement. … But then you
have a type of run like that and you’re like, ‘Hey, let’s do it
again next year.'”

So of course, the
comparisons to Brett Favre commence and what’s amazing (although not
surprising) is how Modano certainly acknowledges how the situations are
very similar. “He
still feels he
can throw and obviously he can,” Modano said. “So I can see why
we at this time get real wishy-washy about what we’re going to
do.”

Modano has not had injury issues in the
later years of his career and while he’s far from the offensive sniper
he had been in the 1990’s, he’s still a very capable two-way player with
above average speed and an incredibly accurate slapshot. So he likely
feels, and I agree, that he has something to add to an NHL team. The
Capitals thought so; they were willing to trade for him at the deadline.

Still,
Modano has a chance to go out relatively on top. The final two games of
the season were incredibly emotional for Modano and the Stars fans and
there is no way that another moment like what we witnessed two weeks ago
will ever be recreated. Modano can come back, but he runs the risk of
being forced into retirement due to injury or another disappointing
year.

And the decision may not be entirely up to him. He’s not
under contract for next year, and the the Stars have yet to decide on
whether to give a contract offer to Modano. The Stars are looking to go
younger and have a limited budget to do so. If the Stars decide to move
on without Modano, and with the franchise player aiming to become part
owner, I doubt he’ll head to another team.